HC Deb 15 May 2002 vol 385 cc880-8

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Dan Norris.]

10.13 pm
Dr. Andrew Murrison (Westbury)

I am grateful to have secured this debate, and for the support of right hon. and hon. Friends, which demonstrates the importance that we attach to this issue. I am also grateful to the Minister for appearing, especially as he is a Wiltshire MP; I hope that he will bring to the debate a particular insight into the issue.

I have learned that my hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) also has a magistrates court in his county town of Oakham in Rutland that is threatened just as the magistrates court in my county town of Trowbridge in Wiltshire is threatened. However, the problem is country wide.

The county's magistrates courts committee recently announced plans to close the West Wiltshire magistrates court in Trowbridge in my constituency and the Devizes courthouse in the constituency of the shadow Foreign Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram). Those plans have been put on hold by the timely intervention of Wiltshire county council. I hope that that will provide a breathing space so that the Minister and the Lord Chancellor can reverse a disastrous decision. My right hon. Friend regrets that he is unable to be here, but having campaigned for much longer than I have for the retention of magistrates courts in Wiltshire, he has asked to be associated with my remarks.

Next week, I shall present a petition with more than 2,000 signatures in support of West Wiltshire magistrates court. Despite that measure of strong local feeling, some people have said to me, "What's the point? It's a done deal." We all moan that the public are uninterested in us and in what we do. The Government's response is to devise ever cleverer ways of re-engaging with them, such as electronic voting and polling booths at supermarkets, but the gist of it is that people feel that they cannot influence events that affect them. If the Government are serious about improving the reputation of politics, they must be prepared to be guided by strongly held local views of the sort that I have the privilege to represent today.

My local youth offending team has just produced a map of young offenders in the West Wiltshire and Kennet districts, and found that the majority live in and around Trowbridge and Devizes. What is more, a high proportion of offences in both districts occur within two miles of the two threatened courthouses. What effect does the Minister suppose that the closures will have on those young offenders, who will now have to find their way to the relatively remote and unfamiliar towns of Chippenham and Salisbury?

Before the election, the then Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions and the then Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food said in their rural blueprint that market towns" must be the focus of a range of private and public services to which people need access. The DETR market town template specified the key services that towns with a population of just 10,000 to 25,000 needed, one of which was the presence of a magistrates court. That was reiterated in the Government paper entitled "Criminal Justice: The Way Ahead", which states: People should look upon their local Magistrates' Court or Crown Court as a public service in the same way they view hospitals and schools. The Countryside Agency, in its annual rural proofing report, says that the Government should look again at the national policy framework within which decisions are currently taken about the location of magistrates' courts. The closure of magistrates' courts in market and small rural towns may be yielding savings for the Lord Chancellor's Department but is causing concern about higher costs and greater inconvenience for those in rural areas. That is important, because it comes from the Countryside Agency—a Government quango. It is a great shame that the Government are not minded to take that sound advice.

In Wiltshire, the situation has already sparked the resignation of one of our longest-serving justices of the peace, and I fear that more resignations may be in the pipeline. The fact is that our magistracy are to be packed off to vast justice factories in the large urban centres. Farewell, then, to the notion that justice should be dispensed locally by those with some knowledge of the context in which a crime has been committed and in which a sentence handed down would ultimately be served. Farewell to any chance that the convicted will feature in the local press, so that justice can be seen to be done.

The Auld report endorsed a system of lay magistracy that has existed since 1361. I hope that the Minister will forgive me if I detect a desire to draw that to a close by way of the Government's centralisation of justice. Only this week, we have heard that magistrates are to be discouraged from using their JP post-nominals, a practice that I recall at least one Minister was pleased to follow until fairly recently. In itself that seems pretty unimportant, but it is symbolic of an attempt to downgrade the office. The implication behind the move may well add to the disillusion that is by stealth eroding the lay magistracy, paving the way for more stipendiaries in large sub-regional courthouses. We hear that Ministers are turning their backs on stealth. Let them come clean about their intentions for the bench.

In a previous debate on a similar issue, the Minister used in his defence a quote from the Government's document "The Way Ahead". He said: A criminal justice system must be effective at preventing offending and re-offending, efficient in the way in which it deals with cases, responsive to the needs of the victim and the law-abiding community and accountable for its decisions."—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 31 October 2001; Vol. 373, c. 270-71WH.] I hope that that is not in his speaking notes again. It strikes me on rereading Hansard as something of an own goal.

My comments are couched mainly in general terms, but Wiltshire's case is put extremely well in the county council's paper, which was sent to the Lord Chancellor in March. Wiltshire is a deceptive county. Its population lives in a doughnut around Salisbury plain, which, as the Minister knows, is the size of the Isle of Wight. That means that transport is far more difficult than the uninitiated imagine. To compound that, we learn that the closure of Trowbridge and Devizes would mean that the number of petty session divisions and courthouses would be far fewer than in other rural counties. Given that in some courts more than 40 per cent. of adjournments occur because defendants fail to turn up, I foresee grave difficulties for Wiltshire with far fewer courthouses than average, and unique geographic and transport challenges.

Of course, we must upgrade our courthouses. In particular, we must make them more accessible to disabled people. We must also ensure that they are healthy and safe for all who have business in them. There is no doubt that Charles Dickens would recognise Trowbridge courthouse, which needs to be brought kicking and screaming into the 21st century as a matter of urgency. The fabric of the building is inadequate and needs serious attention.

However, Ministers should be careful for two reasons. First, they should be careful when using the human rights agenda to proscribe, for example, the appearance of accused in handcuffs as they walk only a few feet from the police van to the courthouse door. If that constrains the rights of those who are not well off or who live in remote areas to equal access to justice, I wonder what, on balance, has been gained. Secondly, the Minister should note that disabled people are more likely than average to lose out if they are forced to travel to gain access to justice. Closures based on the cost of upgrading court rooms may be unhelpful.

We must recognise that those who have business in magistrates courts—the accused and their families, witnesses and victims—tend to be at the poorer end of the social spectrum. Many are on benefit, and many do not have ready access to transport. The hurdle that the closures present will be far higher for them than for the better off. The hurdle for those who live in remote rural areas will be higher than for those who live in towns. How does that square with the Government's stated desire to create an equitable and fair society?

A local policeman said to me that it is already difficult enough getting people to attend court in Trowbridge. If he had to get them to attend in Chippenham, there would be little chance. The well-off urbanite therefore presents himself at Chippenham in a timely fashion and the poor man from a small town or village does not, for a complex variety of reasons—and the Government believe that they are creating a fairer society.

The Minister cannot hide behind the decisions of the magistrates courts committees, as I regret that he did in his letter to me of 8 April. He knows that Wiltshire magistrates courts committee is caught between a rock and a hard place. In his haste to indulge an expensive taste in wall coverings, the Lord Chancellor has neglected to furnish magistrates courts committees with the necessary funding to cover the crippling extra burdens that he has imposed on them.

Although £600,000 buys mighty fine wallpaper, it would also renovate six court houses such as Trowbridge and ensure that people in areas like mine continue to have ready access to justice. Lord Chief Justice Auld is clear where the responsibility lies: in his opinion, courthouse closures are driven by the Lord Chancellor's Department. It is important to remember where the blame lies. It is reprehensible of Ministers to pretend that that is a matter for magistrates courts committees when the responsibility lies firmly with Ministers. I hope that the Minister will take home some of those points. I recognise that he is a Wiltshire MP; he will therefore know the geography of the area. I also hope that the Countryside Agency's point about the rurality of the area, along with the need to ensure access, the special situation of Wiltshire with regard to transport, and the large area of Salisbury plain in the middle which means that access from north to south is extremely difficult, will convince him that we have a case for keeping the Trowbridge and Devizes courthouses open. A particularly telling revelation was made by the county council, which showed that, were those courthouses to close, we would have far fewer courthouses than one might expect, compared with similar rural counties in the south-west and nationwide.

This is an important issue that affects us all, wherever our constituencies may be. It is about access to justice, one of the most fundamental tenets that we value in this country. My strong concern is that, with the closure of those two courthouses and a move towards a system of justice based in large urban centres and housed in vast justice factories, that access would be denied, particularly to the most vulnerable and to those who live in rural areas. I am sure that the Minister does not want that to happen, and hon. Members on this side of the House certainly do not. I hope, therefore, that he will be able to give us some reassurance today about these two important courthouses and, more generally, about courthouses in other parts of the country.

10.26 pm
Mr. Robert Key (Salisbury)

May I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Westbury (Dr. Murrison) and the Minister for allowing me a few minutes to speak in this traditional Adjournment debate?

There have been courts in Salisbury since the city was founded in 1220, and I hope that there will be for a long time to come. I have not actually represented Salisbury since 1220: only since 1983. In that time, however, I have seen courts close. We lost the court in Tisbury, but we learned to live with that. My late mother was a magistrate in Salisbury in her day. I am old enough to recall the Assizes sitting in the Guildhall courts in Salisbury; the judge's procession from his lodgings in the close provided a moment of awe. The city came to a standstill, the traffic stopped and people stood still on the pavement as the judge walked past. Those days have gone, but I suspect that the quality of justice may have been better then.

My hon. Friend is wholly right to campaign for local access to justice in his constituency, and in that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram). These proposals are a Treasury-driven exercise, and I understand and respect the position in which the Minister finds himself. I have to thank the magistrates in my constituency for upholding the law, and the dignity of the law, in picturesque but antediluvian surroundings. I also have to thank the solicitors, the Crown Prosecution Service and the police. They, too, make the law work in facilities that are not at all appropriate to modern expectations. Salisbury magistrates courts also fail to meet the standards set as a result of the Government's decision to introduce the Human Rights Act 1998 to British law.

The problem facing us all is: who is going to pay and when will this happen? We were told some years ago that the Lord Chancellor's Department would pay, but it always seems short of money and living hand to mouth at the end of the financial year, with the result that perhaps only a few crumbs might slip towards Wiltshire. Our constituents deserve better than that. They deserve to have their courthouses in Devizes and in Trowbridge, as well as in Salisbury.

I was interested to see who supported the magistrates courts committee proposals. Of course, the Crown Prosecution Service, the probation service, the prisoner escort services and most of the Wiltshire justices of the peace support the Lord Chancellor's proposals, as, of course, do I. I was surprised, however, to see that the Wiltshire police authority apparently opposes them. I got that information in a written parliamentary answer from the Minister on 10 April 2002, at column 45W of Hansard.

The assistant chief constable of Wiltshire police wrote to the justices' clerk on 27 September 2001 as follows: We would not be in favour of the number of court sites in the County being reduced to less than three, preferably at Swindon, Salisbury and Chippenham. He also wrote to the justices' chief executive on 23 January this year to say: We support the closure of the Guildhall at Salisbury and its relocation to a purpose built building as this can only improve the administration of justice in the south of the county. I wonder why the police authority has acted against the advice of the police, but that is not a matter for me; it is a fact that I hope the Minister will bear in mind.

I am disappointed by the county council's decision to oppose the proposals. It has not had the courtesy to offer me any explanation, or to show me the submission that it sent to the Lord Chancellor, but it must be a partial case. We in Salisbury hope very much that the Lord Chancellor's Department will accede to the suggestions of the magistrates court committee.

Perhaps I can offer a crumb of comfort to my hon. Friend, who I hope will be able to persuade the Minister to change his mind and save the courts. It is significant that the magistrates court committee intends, if the proposals go ahead, to ensure full integration of magistrates court staff with Crown and county court staff at the Salisbury courthouse. It also intends—this is, perhaps, more of an innovation—to install live video links in other rural community facilities, such as libraries, police stations and schools, particularly for the benefit of witnesses and victims in the more rural parts of Wiltshire such as my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Westbury.

I think that system could work. I have seen it work very well in the context of the new proposals for courts martial. In Cyprus, for example, I have seen successful links between courtrooms there and courts martial centres in Aldershot.

I thank my hon. Friend again for allowing me, briefly, to support his case, but also to point out that we in Salisbury hope very much that we will get our new courthouse.

10.31 pm
The Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department (Mr. Michael Wills)

Let me begin, as is traditional, by congratulating the hon. Member for Westbury (Dr. Murrison) on securing the debate. I seem to have been replying to a number of debates on magistrates courts and Crown court closures in recent months; this is the second in the current month.

When courts close, local Members of Parliament—understandably, and reflecting the understandable concerns of their constituents—become rather agitated, and often seek debates such as this. I entirely understand the hon. Gentleman's legitimate anxieties, although I was slightly surprised that he used a fair amount of his precious parliamentary time to engage in what I considered to be irrelevant party political knockabout. I certainly failed to see the relevance of some of his points.

These are serious issues for all concerned, and we take them seriously. As everyone knows, we are about to embark on measures to implement the recommendations we will accept from Lord Justice Auld's report on the review of the criminal court system. That will inevitably have implications for the magistrates courts, and I think it important for us to discuss them with the seriousness that they deserve.

I think that before I deal specifically with Wiltshire—as the hon. Gentleman pointed out, I am a Wiltshire Member, and as such I am familiar with much of the background—I should deal with the context in which decisions are made. The hon. Gentleman's speech demonstrated that he had not wholly understood the process, so I want to clarify it. As he probably knows, magistrates courts are managed by locally based magistrates courts committees. each of which is solely responsible for the efficient and effective administration of the courts in its area.

The hon. Gentleman cannot have it both ways. Either, as he alleges, we are hell bent on centralisation, or—as he also alleged—we are trying to duck out of decentralising responsibility to the local courts. It must be one or the other. Being in opposition, the hon. Gentleman has the privilege of being able to make two contradictory allegations at the same time.

Dr. Murrison

rose—

Mr. Wills

I am happy to give way, but I should point out that as we must finish in nine minutes, my important remarks about Wiltshire will inevitably be curtailed if I do so.

Dr. Murrison

Removing Trowbridge and Devizes magistrates courts and sending cases to Chippenham must be viewed as centralisation. I also think the Minister must not duck the issue of the Government's ultimate responsibility for closures. That is the issue that faces him now.

Mr. Wills

There is no question of ducking anything. Courts have to close under all Governments and the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) gave an example from his constituency. It is regrettable, but courts have to close for particular reasons that are not all Treasury driven. To dismiss the needs of disabled people and other perfectly fair human rights considerations does no credit to anyone.

The remarks that the hon. Member for Westbury made about the use of handcuffs are irrelevant. I do not want to take up precious time now, but I will be happy to discuss the matter with him on another occasion and explain the true position about the application of human rights measures to the courts.

It is the responsibility of magistrates courts committees, which are locally based and know their areas best, in consultation with the relevant paying authorities, which are also locally based, to determine how many courthouses, whether urban or rural, as well as other types of accommodation, are needed locally. In discharging this statutory responsibility, the Government expect magistrates courts committees to undertake regular reviews of their accommodation requirements. In doing so, they follow set guidelines which take into account crucial factors such as the strategic aims of each magistrates courts committee, the facilities that are needed, and the results of user surveys. They have to strike a balance—I appreciate that this can be difficult and that there is sometimes strong local opposition—between providing an efficient and effective service to their users and maintaining secure, well equipped court accommodation, and ensuring reasonably full utilisation of court facilities.

It is slightly ironic to be lecturing Conservative Members about the proper use of taxpayer's money, as for many years we heard them use this rhetoric but never fulfil it in practice. We believe that we have to be prudent custodians of taxpayers' money and I would have hoped that, at the very least, the hon. Gentleman could have agreed with that.

Dr. Murrison

I was being a little facetious about wallpaper, but the point was well made. I was referring to the inefficient use of funds. I was also trying to point out that magistrates courts can be renovated relatively cheaply. I agree with the Minister that it is not just a matter of resources, but I am afraid that resources are a large part of the efficient use of public money, and I used a fairly good example.

Mr. Wills

I am happy to agree with the hon. Gentleman that he was being facetious, but not about much else. Owing to the constraints on time, I shall have to omit the remarks that I was about to make about the general background, since I want to say something about the situation in Wiltshire. Although I register the concerns that the hon. Gentleman has expressed, he has not recognised the complexity of the case and hasunderstandably—left out a number of salient facts.

An extensive consultation process has continued for some time. The second period of consultation conducted by the magistrates courts committee started in September 2001. As a result of that, it revised its original proposal, accepting that the convenience of victims, witnesses and defendants is more important than strict petty session area boundaries. That will allow cases to be heard at one of the three courts that the MCC proposes to retain, whichever is more convenient to the parties concerned. It is also prepared to stagger court hearings throughout the day for those who have to travel greater distances. That shows the responsiveness of a local body to local needs.

The magistrates courts committee investigated the possibility of upgrading the three courthouses, but found that much of the necessary work on the two, town centre, grade 2 listed buildings at Trowbridge and Salisbury was impossible and prohibitively expensive. I remind the hon. Gentleman that the third is a temporary mobile construction on a restricted site at Devizes which was acquired second-hand from what was then the local education authority. That is hardly the standard of accommodation we want for our courthouses. In the circumstances, one has to examine carefully whether value for money and the interests of justice will be best achieved by keeping the courthouses open. I hope that we can at least agree that this is a legitimate case for study. We have to explore the options and we expect the MCCs to do that.

The overwhelming consideration is to reduce the number of under-used courtrooms. The degree of use in Wiltshire is under the national average by a considerable amount, as I suspect the hon. Gentleman knows. Between October and December last year, the national average utilisation figure was 60.5 per cent., but the figure for Wiltshire was 49.4 per cent. In the interests of everybody, we have to consider how to increase that figure.

On 8 February, Wiltshire MCC made a final determination, under section 56 of the Justices of the Peace Act 1997, to close Trowbridge courthouse with effect from 1 April. In accordance with that Act, Wiltshire county council formally lodged an appeal against the determination on 11 March. The appeal process is continuing, and each party is being given the opportunity to make its case for closure or retention of the courts. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that responsibility for deciding whether the appeal should be upheld resides ultimately with the Department.

Once both parties have confirmed that they have no further representations to make, I will be asked to make a decision, which will be final and binding on all parties. The hon. Gentleman will doubtless be aware that the MCC has recently requested a meeting with me, and in my response I will point out that I am happy to meet all interested parties separately to discuss the matter in detail. If the hon. Gentleman wants to discuss these issues seriously—unfortunately, for reasons of time I have been unable to address several of them this evening—I am happy to invite him to the meeting, or to meet him separately. [Interruption.] I think that he is indicating some form of assent, so my office will get in touch with his to arrange a mutually convenient time in the near future. At that meeting, I hope that we can discuss these issues in rather more detail than was possible today.

The hon. Member for Salisbury commented on his constituency, so perhaps I might spend a few moments on that. The MCC has submitted a business case, and as a result officials in the Lord Chancellor's Department have submitted a bid for additional funding in the spending review to support small court schemes. If the MCC's determination to commission a courthouse in Salisbury is permitted, it will be procured via a route known as the "2 stage design and build". which is used by Government Departments for acquiring new buildings when capital becomes available.

I hope that my brief remarks have shown that these issues are complex. We must take account of everything and ensure that courts are fully utilised. Apart from anything else, that allows business to be conducted efficiently. It is in no one's interests—and certainly not of local justice—if people are unable to have their cases heard in court at the appointed time. The hon. Member for Westbury made many fair points about travel times and convenience for victims and witnesses, but it is also convenient for those people that their cases be heard when they are scheduled—a point that relates to the efficient use of court space.

These are complex issues to which there is never an easy answer. Any decision to close a court is always going to evoke local opposition. We must find a right way forward, but that can be done only through dialogue—hence my offer of a meeting. In the end, we are looking to provide a modern system of justice, with well equipped and secure courtrooms. We want to reduce delay in the time taken for cases to proceed through these courts—

The motion having been made after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, MR. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at seventeen minutes to Eleven o'clock.